she came back she found the door wide open and no one standing there.
She thought it very odd, for her sister always came every night to the
door to meet her on her return. She went upstairs; her sister was not
there; the whole house was empty and deserted. There she must stay all
alone, for the evening had closed in, and it was impossible to go
outside and seek her with any hope of success. So all the night long
she waited, crying, "Someone has been here, and they have stolen her
away; they have stolen my darling away! Oh, sister! sister!" Next
morning, very early, going out to continue the search, she found one
of the pearls belonging to her sister's necklace tied up in a small
piece of saree; a little farther on lay another, and yet another, all
along the road the Prince had gone. Then the Princess understood that
her sister had left this clue to guide her on her way, and she at once
set off to find her again. Very, very far she went--a six months'
journey through the jungle, for she could not travel fast, the many
days' walking tired her so much--and sometimes it took her two or
three days to find the next piece of saree with the pearl. At last she
came near a large town, to which it was evident her sister had been
taken. Now, this young Princess was very beautiful indeed--as
beautiful as she was wise--and when she got near the town she thought
to herself, "If people see me, they may steal me away, as they did my
sister, and then I shall never find her again. I will therefore
disguise myself." As she was thus thinking she saw by the side of the
road the corpse of a poor old beggar woman, who had evidently died
from want and poverty. The body was shrivelled up, and nothing of it
remained but the skin and bones. The Princess took the skin and washed
it, and drew it on over her own lovely face and neck, as one draws a
glove on one's hand. Then she took a long stick and began hobbling
along, leaning on it, toward the town. The old woman's skin was all
crumpled and withered, and people who passed by only thought, "What an
ugly old woman!" and never dreamed of the false skin and the beautiful
girl inside. So on she went, picking up the pearls--one here, one
there--until she found the last pearl just in front of the palace
gate. Then she felt certain her sister must be somewhere near, but
where she did not know. She longed to go into the palace and ask for
her, but no guards would have let such a wretched-looking old woman